


Girlfriend

by navaan



Category: Birds of Prey (Comic), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Everybody knows, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Kissing, POV Female Character, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-15
Updated: 2015-10-15
Packaged: 2018-04-26 11:48:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5003632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/navaan/pseuds/navaan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oracle was smart. Crazy smart. So it was anyone's guess how she hadn't seen this coming for a long time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Girlfriend

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gwenfrankenstien](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gwenfrankenstien/gifts).



> Written for FemslashEX for Gwenfrankenstein.

Barbara had always been smart; very much smarter than average and she knew it. 

That didn't mean she couldn't also make stupid ass decisions. She'd been a teenager who had jumped into a bat costume without thinking so much as twice about it after all. Not even once had she looked back with regret at this particular stroke of teenage genius, but she had to admit she hadn't thought it through as much as a person of her smarts should have.

She would also be the first to admit that she wasn't the best at judging personal relationships despite her genius brain.

So it should have been the first telling sign that she was very much missing something when Helena kissed Dick when they were undercover and the only apology she came up with afterwards for kissing Barbara's ex was: “I knew you wouldn't mind. It's not like you haven't moved on.” Because Helena could be angry and surly and difficult and they both had their problems, but that really wasn't an apology.

Hopefully her glare conveyed exactly how much her own moving on counted for anything. “Of course I moved on,” Barbara groused. _She_ had been the one to end things after all. 

Dinah chuckled fondly. She was leaning against the wall and watching the post-mission briefing like it wasn't her concern. “You've moved on alright, girlfriend,” she said and grinned at Barbara. Telling each other about all their slightly messed up and complicated relationships was one of their frequent bonding experiences. So Barbara knew she was teasing and rolled her eyes at her: “You ought to know, pretty bird.”

The way that Helena looked from one to the other as they grinned at each other as if she wasn't there should have been the next big sign for Barbara to notice. She didn't and Helene just shrugged her shoulders, muttering “That's what I meant. No harm done.” I should have clued her in right away; or given her the first clue at least that others were seeing something she hadn't picked up on yet.

She worked with the world's greatest detective, for god's sake, and had no reason to think her mind wasn't on par with his. Information was her strong point. She should have known what to look for.

But superhero life got crazy so frequently that it was always easy to ignore whatever you didn't want to face right now. Story of her life. So she managed to not even think about that comment for even one single moment until the day that Dinah was using her shower, singing a rock song at the top of her lungs, when Nightwing appeared inside her window to throw her a data stick he'd promised to bring by tonight. For the tiniest moment his face was all business, all Batman-in-the-field-approved, and then he heard Dinah's voice blaring about love and roses and wine and guitars or whatever and the part of his face that always remained visible beneath the mask suddenly turned him back into Dick Grayson: all mischievous humor and appreciation for the strange moments in life.

“That's a nice serenade,” he pointed out.

“Dinah just came back from a little... fight... in the sewers,” she provided absentmindedly, reaching for the stick. 

And Dick's smile grew wider and then soft as he looked at her. She returned his look calmly, trying to assess in what mood he was exactly, because soft looks and Dick Grayson hadn't been going well together for her lately, and whatever that messed up thing between them had been at one time, they had moved on and were still friends and she wanted to keep it that way.

But in his usual form of nonchalance he jumped inside, barely making a sound as he moved and leaned down to kiss her cheek and hug her. Momentarily she remained frozen and stunned, not sure what exactly she had missed that was warranting a Grayson-style moment of emotional closeness.

No, really she drew a blank. 

But he drew a way, chuckling a bit and not looking like someone who needed comfort or who was ill-advisedly still pining after his ex-girlfriend and declared: “That's so great, Babs. I'm just so happy for you. You deserve to be happy.”

The amount of time it took her brilliant mind to piece together what the true meaning behind his words was, gave him the chance to hop back onto the window sill and hold himself there long enough to grin back at her: “Sorry, got to run. You know how B gets when we dally on a work night, huh? But I want to know everything, okay?”

She couldn't say anything, did not have time for a sharp comeback or rebuke, because Dinah chose the exact moment to come out of the shower, wrapped in a white towel, moving a smaller one around her stills dripping wet hair. She hadn't even stopped humming her song. Nightwing saluted her and she, taking the appearance of dark shaped hero types at Gotham windows as in stride as Barbara would have expected, waved at him as he went. Barbara just stared at her, Dinah took the moment to lean over her wheelchair and reach out over her shoulder to steal a sip from her coffee mug – and somehow the whole situation seemed so hilarious suddenly that Barbara started to laugh. “Get your own coffee, Dinah. You know where the coffee maker is. You practically live here.”

“It's so much better when it's yours,” Dinah said cryptically and sauntered back into the kitchen to get her own cup - the cup with the Batgirl picture that Barbara kept for her in the cupboard over the kitchen sink.

Huh.

Maybe the clues had been there all along after all.

* * *

When Dinah leaned over her shoulder to look at her screen, Barbara did not pull away. Her lips were close to Dinah's cheek and her breath was ghosting over Dinah's skin, as Dinah was asking questions about security set-ups and the feasibility of locking Poison Ivy inside a bank vault.

Barbara heard her voice, but she wasn't sure she was hearing the words.

Finally, Dinah noticed and turned to look and that brought their lips so close to each other, that Barbara could nearly taste Dinah already without even touching.

“Oh,” Dinah breathed, and that was all she got to say before Barbara finally leaned in to kiss her. Her arms were around Dinah's shoulders to hold her in place, because if she pulled away her chances of following would be negligible. Barbara had calculated the risk already. 

Apparently Dinah had no plans to go anywhere though and held on just as tightly, turning the sloppy, dry kiss into something much more exciting. Barbara couldn't remember when her heart had last been beating this fast, or her palms had been this sweaty. It was High school and teenage angst and insecurity all over again.

But when Dinah finally did pull away she was smiling. “Hey, genius,” she said. “I thought you hadn't noticed.” Clearly she was talking about this thing between them.

“I wasn't sure you... really...”

“ _I_ wasn't sure with my track record with relationships I should be really going for it. I don't want to lose what we have.”

It was a horribly accurate description of her own fears. “I'm not an easy person to be with either,” she grudgingly admitted. It wasn't like her issues weren't obvious.

Dinah chuckled. “Yeah, you are stubborn, and you drive me up the wall.”

“Well, you're impulsive and reckless and nearly give me a heart-attack every single day.”

A clear and happy laugh was the only answer to her admonishment. “Seems we deserve each other. Everything is working out, don't you agree?”

The sentiment warmed her heart, made her insides feel tingly and elated. They were going to try this. Actually try this. “Dinah,” she said reaching for her hand. “I don't want to lose you either. You're important to me. My best friends. My partner. And I believe in us. In all that we built together.”

Dinah's whole face lit up and she leaned down to press a chaste kiss against Barbara's lips, pulling away too soon. “It's more stability with you than I ever had, Babs.”

“See, we already are working out.” Which – she might have to thank Dick and Helena for later for pointing it out so clearly.

“Let me get us some food then,” Dinah said and shut down the laptop. “This is a date. No work. Lets figure this out like normal people.”

Mournfully she looked at the now black screen and only smiled when Dinah laughed at her some more.”Okay,” she said determinedly. “Let's order in. I know your cooking skills already and...”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dinah said laughing. “Let's not ruin a date with cooking.”

“ _Your_ cooking.”

None of this was feeling awkward anymore, just natural, and Barbara wondered when in the last three minutes everything had just fallen in place.

But she was smart. She knew that this wasn't something she could just let slip though her fingers. With her own stubborn determination she would make it work. And Dinah would meet her every step of the way, like she always had.


End file.
